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Part II of an audio recording of the personal biography of Harold Evans Baker born 20 April 1896, Franklin, Idaho. Based on a document compiled and typewritten by his daughter, Marva May Baker, born 7 May 1932. Voiced by his grandson (and Marva’s son) Kirk E Strickland.
Harold relates his happy experience as a newlywed, prosperous farmer, and new father as his wife, Alice Gilbert, gives birth to three of his children: a “robust” son, Orlin Harold Baker; another son, Donald Gilbert Baker; and a longed-for daughter, Melva Baker. Some of these births occur when his wife, Alice, and mother, Lucy Evans, quarrel for reasons he never comes to understand. He recounts working joyfully with his younger brother, John Reynold “Reynie” Baker and under a sharecropping arrangement with his father, Benjamin Charles Baker. After a period of prosperity, he cites disappointments and setbacks as farm commodity markets take a downturn forcing him to sell crops at a loss and divest of accumulated property including a home he built in Fairview, Idaho.